Tracking purchases in a location-based services system

ABSTRACT

A system and method for tracking purchases in a location-based services system is disclosed wherein a request for information on a particular product is received from a consumer using a remote terminal. A geographically tailored response to the request is then generated with the location-based services system. At least one offer is then displayed to the consumer based on the geographically tailored response. An acceptance of a respective offer made by the consumer is then processed by the location-based services system and information is stored about the transaction in a usage data file or database.

[0001] This application claims the benefit of U.S. ProvisionalApplication Serial No. 60/286,916, filed Apr. 27, 2001.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

[0002] The present invention relates generally to location-basedservices systems, and more particularly, to tracking purchases that wereoffered or advertised to consumers through the location-based servicessystem.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

[0003] Wireless communication devices have recently evolved from atechnology used by an elite segment of the population to a technologythat is used by the masses. In the year 2000, it has been estimated thatwell over 100 million people in the United States alone subscribed to atleast one type of wireless communication service. Worldwide, the numberof wireless communication device users has reached a staggering numberand is growing all of the time. In the near future, it is envisionedthat almost everyone will own or use some sort of wireless communicationdevice that is capable of performing a variety of functions.

[0004] In addition to traditional wireless communication devices, manydifferent types of portable electronic devices are in use today. Inparticular, notebook computers, palm-top computers, and personal digitalassistants (PDA) are commonplace. The use of wireless communicationdevices is widespread and it is expected that in the near futurecombined mobile telephone/PDA devices will be widely used by the masses.Currently, most of these devices are only used by a small segment of thepopulation due, in large part, to the fact that there are a limitednumber of applications and services available for such devices.

[0005] The Internet has become a widely used medium for providingbusiness information in a variety of forms that are targeted to varioustypes of individuals and businesses. Generally speaking, one of theproblems associated with searching for business information on specificproducts and services using the Internet is being able to locaterelevant business information for products and services that areavailable in a geographic area that is located near the user. As such, aneed exists for a way to provide a broad range of business informationand content to wireless communication devices and workstations that arebased on the respective geographic location of the communication deviceat the time the information is requested.

[0006] Users of several different types of remote terminals often desireto use directory assistance services that are provided by varioustelephone companies. Many of these directory assistance calls originatein a respective metropolitan telephone service area and request listinginformation for listings contained in the same metropolitan servicearea. Most local directory assistance services in use today are handledby an operator that assists the requestor by manually inputting therequested information into an application that searches a databasecontaining residential and business listings. As such, a need exists forproviding an enhanced directory assistance system that is capable ofautomatically providing geographically targeted responses to requesters.

[0007] As set forth above, a need exists for location-based systems thatallow users to search for relevant businesses, services or productsbased on the geographic location of the user. In order to monitortransactions completed or deals offered to consumers through thelocation-based system, a method and system is needed to track purchasesand use of the location-based system.

SUMMARY OF THE PRESENT INVENTION

[0008] A preferred embodiment of the present invention discloses amethod for tracking purchases in a location-based services system. Inthis embodiment, a request for information on a particular product isreceived from a consumer using a remote terminal. A geographicallytailored response to the request is then generated with thelocation-based services system. Then, at least one offer is displayed tothe consumer that is based on the geographically tailored response. Anacceptance of a respective offer made by the consumer is then processedby the location-based services system.

[0009] A campaign offer identifier is preferentially assigned to eachoffer or tailored response. Each campaign offer identifier and thecontents of the offer itself are then stored in a usage database or datafile. Each campaign offer identifier is also associated with arespective consumer and a respective business making the offer. If theconsumer purchases a product, the consumer is charged for the product.Preferentially, an electronic payment card is charged for the product.Information about the electronic payment card is also preferably stored,wherein the information that is stored may be selected from a group ofinformation including a card number, a merchant code, a merchant name, amerchant address, a transaction type, a identifier of productspurchased, an amount of purchase, a date of purchase and a time ofpurchase.

[0010] The geographically tailored response can be generated based on ageographic setting made on the remote terminal by the consumer. As such,if the consumer is traveling from one location to another location theyare able to receive responses that are tailored to the area they aretraveling toward or their final destination. During operation, aplurality of information about each offer is stored in the usagedatabase or data file. The information is selected from a group ofinformation including a campaign identifier, a merchant name, a consumeridentifier, a campaign code, a date, a time, a geographic location ofsaid consumer and an offer number.

[0011] Another preferred embodiment of the present invention discloses alocation-based services system with purchase tracking. This embodimentincludes a remote terminal that is capable of generating a tailoredrequest for information on a product and a geographic indicator that isassociated with the remote terminal. A location-based application serveris connected to each remote terminal and is operable to receive thetailored requests for information and the geographic indicator from theremote terminal. The location-based application server is also operableto generate a structured response to the tailored request forinformation on the product that is dependent on the geographic indicatorprovided by the remote terminal. The structured response ispreferentially transmitted to the remote terminal and displayed on theremote terminal in the form of at least one offer.

[0012] Further objects and advantages of the present invention will beapparent from the following description, reference being made to theaccompanying drawings wherein preferred embodiments of the invention areclearly illustrated.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0013]FIG. 1 illustrates a preferred embodiment of the location-basedservices system.

[0014]FIG. 2 is a flow chart illustrating the process steps performed bythe location-based application server when processing structuredrequests.

[0015]FIG. 3 illustrates a preferred method of tracking offerings andpurchases in the location-based services system.

[0016]FIG. 4 illustrates a preferred method of completing transactionsand storing data about said transactions.

[0017]FIG. 5 illustrates a preferred advertising effectivenessapplication.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PRESENTLY PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS OF THEINVENTION

[0018] The present invention discloses a method and system fordelivering location-based services through a variety of communicationnetworks. Referring to FIG. 1, the preferred location-based servicessystem 10 uses the geographic location of a remote terminal 12 toprovide geographically targeted services to the remote terminal 12.Remote terminals 12 that subscribe to the location-based services system10 are capable of selecting and receiving information from a broad rangeof business and service providers that are located in a geographicregion that is close to the remote terminal 12 and, thus, the user.

[0019] As illustrated in FIG. 1, one preferred embodiment of thelocation-based services system 10 includes a remote terminal 12 that isconnected to a wireless communication system 14 using one of severalavailable and commonly used communication protocols. As illustrated, theremote terminal 12 is connected to a base station 16 of the wirelesscommunication system 14, which transmits and receives radio signals tothe remote terminal 12 during operation. Those skilled in the art wouldrecognize that although only one base station 16 is illustrated in FIG.1, several base stations 16 are actually used to make-up the preferredwireless communication system 14. Ideally, the preferred wirelesscommunication system 14 would cover a wide geographic region, such as,by way of example only, the entire United States.

[0020] In the preferred embodiment of the present invention, the remoteterminal 12 is capable of sending a digital input signal to the basestation 16. The term digital input signal should be broadly construed toinclude voice signals, keypad input data, and pointer device selectionsor data from any other commonly used means for inputting data into arespective remote terminal 12. Those skilled in the art would recognizethat several peripheral devices are available for various types ofremote terminals 12 that could be used to input data into the remoteterminals 12 and may be taken advantage of by the present invention.

[0021] Preferentially, the wireless communication system 14 is a digitalcommunication system that uses one of several different methods ofproviding wireless digital communication between the remote terminals 12and the base stations 16. The wireless communication system 14 can usefrequency division duplexing (FDD) or time division duplexing (TDD) toallocate for the two directions of transmission between the remoteterminal 12 and the base station 16.

[0022] In order to provide multiple access methods to the remoteterminals 12, which refers to the method of creating multiple channelsfor each transmission direction, one of several different types ofmultiple access methods may be used in the present invention. Threepreferred types of multiple access methods that might be used include:frequency division multiple access (FDMA); time division multiple access(TDMA); and/or code division multiple access (CDMA). Those skilled inthe art would recognize that the present invention could readily beadapted to take advantage of other multiple access methods as well.

[0023] As further illustrated in FIG. 1, in the preferred embodiment ofthe present invention the base station 16 of the wireless communicationsystem 14 is connected to a public switched telephone network (PSTN) 18by a public switch 20. As known to those skilled in the art, the PSTN 18is a worldwide voice telephone network that is used to allow variouscommunication devices to communicate with each other. Although thepreferred PSTN 18 is a digital system, the present invention may beadapted for use on analog systems as well to accommodate geographicregions that might be underdeveloped or not serviced by a digitalsystem.

[0024] The public switch 20 transfers the signals that are received fromthe base station 16 to a private branch exchange (PBX) 22. The publicswitch 20 is connected to the private branch exchange (PBX) 22, which,as generally known in the art, is a telephone switching system that isused to interconnect various telephone extensions to each other. In thepreferred embodiment of the present invention, the PBX 22 usesall-digital methods for switching and is capable of supporting digitalremote terminals and telephones and analog remote terminals andtelephones. As set forth in greater detail below, in the preferredembodiment, the PBX 22 is connected to a server of the location-basedservices system 10, which is a form of a digital remote terminal.

[0025] Referring to FIG. 1, in this embodiment of the present invention,the PBX 22 is connected to at least one voice recognition server 24. Thevoice recognition server 24 contains at least one voice recognitionapplication that is operable to recognize the respective words that arecontained in the voice signals that are received from the PBX 22. As setforth in greater detail below, a resulting output is generated by thevoice recognition application that is used by a natural languageprocessing application.

[0026] The voice recognition server 24 is connected to at least onenatural language processing server 26 that includes at least one naturallanguage processing application that processes the identified wordscontained in the voice signals to ascertain the meaning of the wordsthat are contained in the voice signals. As such, during operation, thevoice recognition server 24 identifies or recognizes the particularwords that are contained in the voice signals and the natural languageprocessing server 26 interprets the meaning of the recognized words ofthe voice signals that are originally generated from the remote terminal12. The natural language processing application may be located on thevoice recognition server 24 in other embodiments of the presentinvention, but, in an effort to increase the level of performance, wouldpreferentially be located on a separate server or a separate set ofservers.

[0027] The natural language processing server 26 is connected to atleast one location-based application server 28. As set forth in detailbelow, the location-based application server 28 is programmed to provideresponsive information to the remote terminals 12 that has beenrequested by a respective user of the remote terminal 12. Generallyspeaking, the location-based application server 28 is used to retrieveand pass on location-based information to the remote terminals 12 invarious data formats. The type of information provided to the remoteterminals 12 varies depending on the specific nature of the informationthat has been requested from the user and the geographic location of theremote terminal 12.

[0028] During operation, after the meaning of the words in the voicesignals are interpreted, the natural language processing server 26 isprogrammed to create a structured request that is sent to thelocation-based application server 28. In response to the structuredrequest, the location-based application server 28 generates a structuredresponse that is sent to the remote terminal 12. As set forth in greaterdetail below, the exact nature of the information sent in the structuredresponse depends on the specific request that is made by a particularuser of the remote terminal 12.

[0029] If an analog voice signal is used, although not illustrated inFIG. 1, at least one digital signal processor server could be used toconvert the analog signal into a digital signal that the voicerecognition server 24 can process and interpret using the voicerecognition applications. In this respective embodiment, the digitalsignal processor server is preferentially connected between the voicerecognition server 24 and the PBX 22. Those skilled in the art wouldrecognize that the voice recognition server 24 might also be designed toperform the functions of the digital signal processor server in otherembodiments of the present invention.

[0030] Each remote terminal 12 also sends a unique remote terminalidentifier to the base station 16 while communicating with the basestation 16 of the wireless communication system 14. The remote terminalidentifier is preferentially attached to each voice signal as it passesthrough the location-based services system 10 so that the system cankeep track of which respective remote terminal 12 is supposed to receivethe information that has been requested. Those skilled in the art wouldrecognize that various identification methods might be used to keeptrack of specific remote terminals 12 using the location-based servicessystem 10.

[0031] As further illustrated in FIG. 1, the location-based applicationserver 28 is also connected to a location gateway server 30, which is,in turn, connected to the base station 16 of the wireless communicationsystem 14. The location gateway server 30 is used by the location-basedapplication server 28 to retrieve a geographic indicator that isassociated with each respective remote terminal 12. As such, while arespective remote terminal 12 is connected to the wireless communicationsystem 14, the location-based application server 28 is capable ofdetermining the respective geographic location of the remote terminal 12so that geographically targeted responses and information can beprovided to the remote terminal 12.

[0032] As illustrated in FIG. 1, the location gateway server 30 ispreferentially connected to the base station 16 of the wirelesscommunication system 14 using a network connection 32, which may be aprivate network connection or an Internet connection in alternativeembodiments of the present invention. The geographic indicator may begenerated by the remote terminal 12 or the base station 16 and ispreferentially transmitted to the location-based application server 28when a user of the remote terminal 12 is accessing the location-basedservices system 10. The geographic indicator is preferentiallytransmitted to the location-based application server 28 with the remoteterminal identifier so that the location-based application server 28 canassociate each respective remote terminal 12 with a particulargeographic location.

[0033] In the preferred embodiment of the present invention, thegeographic indicator may be preset by a user of the remote terminal 12,automatically generated by a GPS located in the remote terminal 12 orgenerated by a specialized geographic determination application runningon the base station 16. In addition, the present invention mayadvantageously take advantage of an enhanced 911 system of the wirelesscommunication system 14 to generate the geographic indicator. In anotherembodiment of this invention, the geographic indicator may originatefrom a combination of these sources and/or systems (i.e. it could comefrom a GPS-assisted network that uses GPS and devices on the network).The geographic indicator may automatically be sent to the location-basedapplication server 28 as soon as a respective remote terminal 12connects to the wireless communication system 14; however, inalternative embodiments of the present invention, the geographicindicator is only sent when a respective remote terminal is sending astructured request to the location-based application server 28. As thegeographic location of the remote terminal 12 changes, the geographicindicator is updated and the updated information can continuously besent to the location-based application server 28.

[0034] As further illustrated in FIG. 1, at least one voice synthesisserver 33 is connected to the location-based application server 28 andthe PBX 22. For voice-related applications of the location-basedservices system 10, the voice synthesis server 33 is used to generatevoice responses that are based on the structured responses that aregenerated in response to the structure requests that are received by thelocation-based application server 28. Voice synthesis applications onthe voice synthesis server 33 are used to transform the structuredresponses into voice response. In the preferred embodiment, the PBX 22is used to transmit the voice responses to the PSTN 18, which, in turn,transmits the voice response to the base station 16, which ultimatelytransmits the voice response on to the remote terminal 12. Inalternative embodiments of the present invention, the voice synthesisserver 33 may be connected directly to respective base stations 16 ofthe wireless communication system 14.

[0035] Referring once again to FIG. 1, in yet another preferredembodiment of the present invention, the remote terminal 12 is connectedto the location-based application server 28 through a wirelessapplication protocol (WAP) gateway 34 of the wireless communicationsystem 14. The WAP gateway 34 is connected to a WAP server 38 of thelocation-based services system 10 through a network connection 36. Thenetwork connection 36 may be a private network connection or an Internetconnection. The WAP server 38 is connected to the location-basedapplication server 28 and, during operation, is used to generatestructured requests, which are based on requests that are input to theremote terminal 12 and sent to the location-based application server 28.

[0036] The remote terminal 12 is capable of communicating with the WAPserver 38 and the location-based application server 28 using a WAPstandard. As known to those skilled in the art, the WAP standard is aprotocol that is designed for wireless communication devices to providesecure access to e-mail and text-based web pages. WAP provides acomplete environment for wireless applications that includes a wirelesscounterpart of TCP/IP and a framework for telephony integration. In thepreferred embodiment of the location-based services system 10, theremote terminals 12 may also be capable of browsing for location-basedservices through the use of text and graphical based menus that can beprovided to the remote terminals 12 from the location-based applicationserver 28.

[0037] One preferred embodiment of the present invention uses the WAPstandard to support the use of a Wireless Markup Language (WML), whichis a streamlined version of HTML for small screen displays, to conductcommunication and transfer information between the remote terminal 12and the location-based application server 28. WAP is also capable ofusing WMLScript, which is a compact JavaScript-like language that iscapable of running in limited memory on the remote terminal 12. Thelocation-based services system 10 can also be designed to advantageouslytake advantage of this capability to provide location-based services tousers of remote terminals 12 depending the particular geographiclocation of the remote terminal 12.

[0038] In this preferred embodiment of the present invention, the WAPstandard supports various handheld input methods such as keypad inputsor pointer device inputs that may be generated on various differenttypes of remote terminals 12. As it relates to the present invention,this gives users of the remote terminals 12 the capability of inputtingdata from keypads for the purposes of entering search requests to thelocation-based services system 10. In addition, the remote terminals 12are capable of receiving, interpreting and displaying web pages thatinclude hypertext links to other web pages that may be selected usingvarious selection methods.

[0039] For the purpose of the present invention, the term wirelessapplication protocol should be broadly construed to include anycommunication protocol similar to what is commonly referred to as the“WAP standard,” which, as set forth above, is used to transmit text andgraphics-based information to remote terminals 12. Although the WAPstandard is used in this particular preferred embodiment of the presentinvention, those skilled in the art should recognize that other text andgraphics-based communication protocols could be used in alternativeembodiments of the present invention.

[0040] For example, although not specifically illustrated, anotherpreferred embodiment of the present invention could be designed for ani-Mode wireless communication system. i-Mode wireless communicationsystems use a packet-based communication protocol to communicate betweenthe remote terminals 12 and the base station 16, which essentially meansthat the remote terminals 12 are connected to the wireless communicationsystem at all times and communicate with the base stations 16 usingpackets. i-Mode is also capable of providing web-browsing and customizedapplications to remote terminals 12.

[0041] i-Mode is a proprietary system that uses a subset of HTML, knownas cHTML, in contrast to the WAP standard, which uses WML. In thisparticular embodiment, an i-Mode server is used to connect the basestation 16 of the wireless communication system 14 to the location-basedapplication server 28. The remaining details of this particularembodiment are similar to other embodiments of the present inventionand, as such, a more detailed discussion is not necessary.

[0042] Referring to FIG. 1, in yet another preferred embodiment of thelocation-based services system 10, a second remote terminal 40 isconnected to a subscriber portal web server 44 through a networkconnection 42. The network connection 42 may be a private networkconnection or an Internet connection. As illustrated, the subscriberportal web server 44 is also connected to the location-based applicationserver 28. During operation, the second remote terminal 40 is programmedto receive structured requests that are sent to the location-basedapplication server 28 and, likewise, the location-based applicationserver 28 is programmed to generate structured responses that are sentto the second remote terminal 40.

[0043] The second remote terminal 40 and the location-based applicationserver 28 preferentially communicate with each other using standardweb-based protocols that are commonly used in various Internet-basedapplications. In this embodiment of the present invention, a useraccesses the subscriber portal web server 44 through the second remoteterminal 40, which is preferentially a computer workstation. As asubscriber to the location-based services system 10, the second remoteterminal 40 is assigned a predetermined geographic indicator. Thegeographic indicator is used by the location-based application server 28to target services and business content to the second remote terminal 40that are based on the geographic location of the second remote terminal40.

[0044] The user of the second remote terminal 40 may be given the optionof setting the geographic indicator to a desired geographic location,which may or may not be the exact geographic location of the secondremote terminal 40. For example, if the user is traveling to anothercity that evening and wants to access location-based services in thatparticular city, an option can be provided allowing the second remoteterminal 40 to designate that particular city.

[0045] In this preferred embodiment of the present invention, the secondremote terminal 40 is preferentially a computer workstation thatincludes multimedia capabilities and includes a microphone and a soundcard. As known to those skilled in the art, this allows the secondremote terminal 40 to generate sound through a speaker system andreceive voice signals through the microphone. Although not specificallyillustrated in FIG. 1, this could allow the subscriber portal web server44 to be connected to the voice recognition server 24 so that voicesignals sent from the second remote terminal 40 could be processedsimilar to the method used to process voice signals received fromwireless remote terminal 12.

[0046] Referring to FIG. 1, a business remote terminal 46 is connectedto a network connection 48 that is connected to an advertiser portal webserver 50. The network connection 48 may be a private network connectionor an Internet connection. The advertiser portal web server 50 allowsvarious businesses (i.e., content providers) to add, modify and/ordelete campaigns that are designed to promote and sell various productsand services through the location-based services system 10. For example,if a particular business entity desires to run a promotion on aparticular product or service, the advertiser portal web server 50allows the business entity to modify their respective listings toinclude the respective items or services on special.

[0047] As further illustrated in FIG. 1, the preferred location-basedservices system 10 is also capable of leveraging data that ispreferentially grouped in four logical data groupings 52. These logicaldata groupings include profile data files 54, business data files 56,additional data files 58 and usage data files 60. The data files 54-60contain detailed information on various items and services that are usedby the location-based services system 10, which is set forth in detailbelow. The data files 54-60 can be located on the location-basedapplication server 28, but are preferentially maintained on separateservers.

[0048] The profile data files 54 contain a group of logical entitiesthat contain relevant information concerning each consumer of thelocation-based services system 10. These logical entities include, butare not specifically limited to the following items: consumer name;consumer phone number; consumer identification; consumer password;consumer home address; consumer home phone number; consumer emailaddress; consumer pager number; consumer service subscriptions(detailing the consumers chosen level of participation in one or moreservices); consumer privacy preferences (detailing information denotingthe willingness to share a consumers private data with others based ondata type, requester, service, etc.); consumer service preferences(detailing any specific saved information that is relevant to any of theservices which a consumer may use, such as: named locations (such as theaddress for a consumers work location, or the address(es) of a consumersfriend(s); named interests or preferences regarding hobbies, news topicinterest, sports, music, preferred brands or chains, banking informationand other demographic information. (such as NBA basketball, Jazz music,Italian food, favorite clothing brands or chains, banking information,etc.)); and preferred asynchronous communication method (such as emailor pager) listed by service and/or service/content provider.

[0049] The business data files 56 are composed of a group of logicalentities containing all relevant information regarding the businesseslisted within the location-based services system 10, including but notlimited to: business name; business phone number; business textdescription; business audio description; business video description;business and/or product images; business identification; businesspassword; business category or categories; advertising participationlevel; advertising campaign information such as: parameters that definetarget market; campaign identification code; advertising content andspecial deals/discounts; saved data mining/reporting parameters; brandssold; brands serviced; product types sold; product types serviced;product models sold; product models serviced; product model prices; andservice prices and inventory list (by brand, product type and productmodel).

[0050] The additional data files 58 contains a group of logical entitiesthat generally includes any additional content that is capable of beingleveraged by the location-based services system 10, possibly including,but not limited to: business ratings (via external evaluation services);weather conditions; driving directions; maps; traffic Although notspecifically illustrated, the residential telephone number and addresslistings may be provided by local telephone companies through aresidential listing server that is connected to the location-basedapplication server 28.

[0051] The usage data files 60 contains a group of logical entities thatgenerally includes all recorded information regarding consumertransactions from remote terminals 12, 40, possibly including, but notlimited to: consumer identification (or a unique hash of consumeridentification); date; time; service used; request type; searchcriteria; matched data purchases made, and actions taken. Those skilledin the art would recognize that several other types of usage data mightbe stored in the usage data files 60.

[0052] As generally set forth above, users of the location-basedservices system 10 are given the ability to search, via a remoteterminal 12, 40, for a business that will satisfy specific purchase orservice requirements using multiple access methods (voice, wirelessapplication protocol or web application protocol). The location-basedapplication server 28 is programmed to handle a variety of structuredrequests and is capable of generating a variety of structured responsesin the same format (i.e.—voice, wireless application protocol or webapplication protocol) that the structured request was received by thelocation-based application server 28.

[0053] Some of the structured request parameters that are capable ofbeing used for the business services provided by the location-basedservices system 10 include (but are not necessarily limited to) one ormore of the following: product type; service type; business name;business category; product name (or model name); product brand; pricelevel; business or service ratings (i.e. external evaluation from arating service such as AAA); whether special deals are provided;location (auto-location (locating nearest ATM for instance), predefinedlocations, or consumer-specified locations); hours of operation;availability of service (for example: availability of a open table at aspecified time at a restaurant); and company specified within favoritesfor a category (i.e., name of favorite coffee house franchise). Thoseskilled in the art would recognize that a variety of structured requestparameters might be used in the present invention.

[0054] Optionally, consumers have the ability to “opt-in” to “push”content and advertising services. Push services are defined as services,which proactively deliver content to the consumer through the remoteterminal 12, 40, rather than services delivered only following a requestby the consumer. As set forth above, the preferences of the consumersthat use the remote terminals 12 are stored within the profile datafiles 54. As such, by way of example only, a consumer that likes golfmay be “pushed” an offering as they travel close to a nearby golfequipment store relating to a special offer on an item such as a golfclub or particular brand of golf ball.

[0055] As set forth briefly above, the location-based services system 10also gives businesses the ability to manage their respective content andmine usage data by using the advertiser portal web server 50. Theadvertiser portal web server 50 preferentially includes the followingweb-based applications: a campaign management application, a businessprofile management application, a mining/reporting and predictivemodeling application. Each of these applications and their respectivefunctional aspects is discussed in greater detail below.

[0056] The campaign management application includes several applicationsthat allow a business to create advertising campaigns and an edit/deleteadvertising campaigns. The create campaign capability enables anadvertiser to create a location-based advertising campaign. As part ofthis capability, the business would define the market segment at whichthe advertising is targeted. Then, the advertiser would define theadvertising content that would be delivered to the target market, aswell as the mechanism of delivery (i.e. pushed to each consumers remoteterminal 12, 40, or presented only to a consumer when they make arelevant enhanced directory assistance request/search). The edit/deletecampaign capability allows the business to modify or delete an existingcampaign that has already been created and is running on thelocation-based application server 28.

[0057] The business profile management application includes a createbusiness listing capability and an edit business listing capability. Thecreate business listing capability enables a business to define theirrespective set of business data (see above for a list of content withinthe business data). The edit business listing capability allows thebusiness to modify or delete their business listing. Those skilled inthe art would recognize that several other options might be madeavailable through the business profile management application.

[0058] The mining/reporting capability allows business to interface withdata that is stored in the usage data files 60. An advertisingeffectiveness interface utilizes the usage data files 60 and businessdata files 56 to generate analysis surrounding the effectiveness oflocation-based advertising campaigns. The analysis will addressquestions such as “How many people received my campaign in the downtownarea of Atlanta”. The information provided to the businesses providesthem insight to quantify the results of campaigns created in thelocation-based services system 10 through the campaign management tool.

[0059] The predictive modeling capability provides forecasting forpotential customers likely to respond to offers, listings and deals.Examples of the type of feedback the consumer will receive include (butnot limited to) the following: identifying customers likely to respondto their campaign by customer segment; identifying customers likely torequest a campaign or listing by customer segment; and identifyingdemands by peak time or day.

[0060] As briefly set forth above, the location-based services system 10provides a consumer using a remote terminal 12, 40 with access toproducts and services in a designated geographic area through multipleaccess methods such as voice, wireless application protocols (such asWAP and cHTML) and web protocols (such as Java and HTML). The presentinvention encompasses the full lifecycle of the location-based servicessystem 10 including delivery and maintenance, which includes contentmanagement, consumer management, content delivery, advertisingmanagement, advertising reporting, advertising delivery, usage tracking,usage mining and reporting, billing and settlements.

[0061] The preferred location-based services system 10 is capable ofproviding location-based services to consumers through remote terminals12, 40 and is managed by various content providers through the use ofrespective business remote terminals 46. The services that are providedthrough the location-based services system 10 preferentially includes anenhanced directory assistance service and an enhanced business servicethat is delivered through a voice recognition capability, wirelessapplication protocol capability and/or web application capability.

[0062] In order to access the enhanced directory assistance services orthe business services, the user of the remote terminal 12 preferentiallyenters a predetermined key sequence (e.g. by pressing 411) on the keypadof the remote terminal 12 or by pressing a specially designed key on theremote terminal 12. If the remote terminal is not connected to the basestation 16 already, when the enhanced directory assistance services orbusiness services are selected, the remote terminal 12 establishes aconnection with the base station 16 of the wireless communication system14, which acts as a gateway to the location-based services system 10.

[0063] In another embodiment, in order to select one of the respectiveservices, the user of the remote terminal 12 is given the option ofusing voice commands, but as previously set forth may also use keypadinputs on the remote terminal 12 to select the desired services as well.Those skilled in the art should recognize that the enhanced directoryassistance services and the business services do not necessarily have tobe provided through the same access method and that a keypad-based menusystem may be used until the appropriate time occurs for the user toinput a voice signal containing a request for information.

[0064] By way of example only, if the enhanced directory assistanceservices are selected by a user of the remote terminal 12, either thebase station 16, the location-based application server 28 or remoteterminal 12 can be programmed to generate a search parameter requestthat is audibly generated on the remote terminal 12. In the embodimentbeing discussed, the search parameter request is sent in the form of avoice signal that prompts the user to state the first and last name ofthe person they are looking for. In addition, the search parameterrequest could also include an option that might prompt to user to alsostate the geographic area where the person is located. As should beapparent from the discussion above, since the location-based servicessystem 10 includes voice recognition applications, those skilled in theart should recognize that the entire process of entering the searchparameter request may be done by voice signals generated on the remoteterminals 12.

[0065] In response to the search parameter request that is generated onthe remote terminal 12, the user preferentially provides a vocalresponse to the remote terminal that is transmitted to the base station16. The vocal response preferentially includes a first name response anda last name response (and possibly a detailed geographic informationresponse for non-local listings) of the particular person the user islooking to retrieve information on. The vocal response to the searchparameter request, which preferentially also includes a unique remoteterminal identifier that is associated with each respective remoteterminal 12, is then sent from the remote terminal 12 to the basestation 16. The base station 16 transmits the voice response to the PSTN18, which then routes the vocal response, together with the remoteterminal identifier, to the PBX 22.

[0066] The PBX 22 transmits the vocal response and the remote terminalidentifier as inputs to voice recognition applications and naturallanguage processing applications that are located on servers 24, 26,which in turn, respectively transform the vocal response and the remoteterminal identifier into a structured residential listing request thatis sent to the location-based application server 28. As set forth indetail above, the voice recognition applications analyze the vocalresponses for the purposes of making a determination of the identity ofparticular words contained in the vocal responses. Any detailedgeographic information provided by the user is also added to thestructured residential listing request that is sent to thelocation-based application server 28.

[0067] As illustrated in FIG. 2, the structured residential listingrequest is used as an input to a residential finder application 62located on the location-based application server 28. During operation,the residential finder application 62 interprets the structuredresidential listing request and uses at least one data access routine 64to locate and retrieve the specific information requested by thestructure residential listing request from a respective database file54-58. Those skilled in the art should recognize that several databaseservers may be connected to the location-based application server 28that are used to store various forms of information and content that isprovided to users by the location-based services system 10 in varyingtypes of formats, which will be set forth in greater detail below.

[0068] In the preferred embodiment of the present invention, theresidential finder application 62 matches up the structured residentiallisting request with the geographic indicator of the remote terminal 12.If no geographic information is contained in the structured response,the residential finder application 62 conducts a search of the profiledata files 54 and the additional data files 58 with data access routines64 targeted within a predetermined area based on the geographic locationof remote terminal 12. If geographic information is included in thevocal response, the residential finder application 62 conducts a searchwithin the geographic area specified by the user. As set forth above, inthe preferred embodiment of the present invention the residentiallisting database files are stored under the additional data files 58 byway of example only and should not be construed as a limitation of thepresent invention.

[0069] The residential finder application 62 preferentially alsosearches the profile data files 54 so that if the identity of the personcontained in the structured residential request is identified as asubscriber of the location-based services system 10, a remote terminal12 telephone number and/or an email address may also be added to theresponse that is provided to the user requesting the desiredinformation. If the located person does turn out to be a subscriber ofthe location-based services system 10, other embodiments of the presentinvention allow the subscriber to create a personalized response that isstored in a database file and is provided in response to residentiallisting requests that identify them.

[0070] In addition to receiving the structured residential listingrequests, the residential finder application 62 obtains a geographicindicator and a remote terminal identifier associated with the remoteterminal 12. This allows the system to default to the geographiclocation of the remote terminal 12 to conduct the search, as set forthabove. For instance, if the remote terminal 12 is located in Atlanta,Georgia, the residential finder application 62 will know this from thegeographic indicator and will only search listings in the Atlanta area.

[0071] Once the appropriate data is located by the residential finderapplication 62 that is responsive to the structured residential listingrequest, which in the present example would preferentially include atleast one telephone number and/or the address of the person(s) named inthe voice signal, the residential finder application 62 is operable togenerate a structured residential response that is sent to voicesynthesis server 33. As set forth in detail above, the voice synthesisserver 33 is programmed to transform the structured residential responseinto a voice response signal with voice synthesis applications locatedon the voice synthesis server 33.

[0072] As set forth briefly above, the voice response that are generatedby the voice synthesis server 33 can include the name, address,residential telephone number, mobile number and/or email address of theparticular person for which the user has requested a residentiallisting. For those instances where the structured residential responsesinclude more than one residential listing, the residential listingfinder application 62 is preferentially programmed to generate astructured residential response that provides the multiple listingresults in a predetermined organized listing arrangement.

[0073] The predetermined organized listing arrangement is preferentiallyset up so that the user of the remote terminal 12 is capable ofinteracting with the listings provided in the voice response through theuse of a keypad input or by voice signals that are spoken into theremote terminal 12 by the user. Preferentially, the information isorganized and presented to the user of the remote terminal 12 based onthe address of the particular people identified by the residentialfinder application 62, however, those skilled in the art would recognizethat other alternatives of presenting and organizing the results exist(i.e.—ranking the results in geographic order) are capable of being usedin varying embodiments of the present invention.

[0074] If the person for whom information has been requested isdesignated as being unlisted or unavailable, the location-basedapplication server 28 is preferentially programmed to generate astructured residential response that contains a message that indicatesthat the requested information is unlisted or unavailable. As such, inthis particular embodiment of the present invention the location-basedapplication server 28 sends the structured residential response to thevoice synthesis server 33, which generates a voice signal that is sentto the remote terminal 12 informing the user that requested theresidential listing that the requested residential listing it unlistedor unavailable.

[0075] As briefly set forth above, another preferred embodiment of thelocation-based services system 10 is capable of providing businessservices to the remote terminal 12, which are provided to the remoteterminal 12 based on the geographic location of the remote terminal 12.If the user of the remote terminal 12 selects the business servicesoption instead of the enhanced directory assistance services option, avariety of information services are capable of being delivered to theuser through the location-based services system 10. During operation,the business services are provided to the remote terminal 12 throughsimilar access methods that the residential listing services areprovided to the remote terminal 12. In addition to being able to obtainthe address and telephone number of local businesses, various otherforms of business information is capable of being transmitted to theremote terminal 12 by the location-based services system 10.

[0076] As generally set forth above and in greater detail below, some ofthe preferred structured business request parameters that are capable ofbeing processed by the business services of the location-based servicessystem 10 include (but are not necessarily limited to) one or more ofthe following parameters: product/service types; business names;business category; product name (or model name); product brands; pricelevel; business or service ratings (e.g.—external evaluation from arating service such as AAA); whether special deals or offers are beingprovided; auto-location of predefined services (e.g.—locating thenearest ATM for instance); hours of operation; availability of service(e.g.—availability of a open table at a specified time at a restaurant);and/or business information specified within a user defined favoritescategory (e.g.—name of favorite coffee house franchise, favoriteclothing brands, favorite restaurants).

[0077] In this preferred embodiment of the present invention, once auser of the remote terminal 12 gains access to the business servicesprovided by the location-based services system 10, they are prompted bya voice signal requesting the user to state their respective businessrequest. In response to the prompt for a business request, the userstates a vocal response that is received by the remote terminal 12 thatcontains a predetermined request for a predetermined type of businesscontent. The exact nature and content of the vocal response will vary,depending on the specific type of business/service information that isbeing requested by the user of the remote terminal 12. As set forthabove and below, the preferred embodiment of the present inventionincludes natural language processing applications the are used tointerpret the meaning and context of the words contained in the vocalresponse, thereby allowing the user of the remote terminal 12 to make arequest using requests that are spoken using statements commonly used ineveryday conversations.

[0078] By way of example only, lets say that a respective user of theremote terminal 12 wants to obtain business information related todetermining the location of a favorite local fast-food restaurant. Assuch, the user's vocal response that is received by the remote terminal12 might contain a voice signal that includes a request for businessinformation that could be phrased something along the lines of thefollowing statement: “What is the address of a Burger King restaurantthat is close to my present location?” As previously set forth, thispreferred embodiment of the present invention is capable of interpretingthis request using natural language processing applications to generatea structured response.

[0079] As with the residential services, in this embodiment of thepresent invention the vocal response that is provided by the user of theremote terminal 12 is transmitted from the remote terminal 12 to thebase station 16 of the wireless communication system 14, which in turnis operable to transmit the vocal response to the PSTN 18 that transmitsthe vocal response to the PBX 22. The vocal response is then sent fromthe PBX 22 to the voice recognition server 24 where it is processed withvoice recognition applications to determine the identity or recognizethe respective words that are contained in the vocal response from theuser containing a business information request. Although notillustrated, in an alternative embodiment of the present invention thebase station 16 is directly connected to the voice recognition server24, thereby allowing the base station 16 to directly transmit vocalresponse to the voice recognition server 24.

[0080] After the words contained in the vocal response have beenrecognized using voice recognition applications, a respective output isgenerated by the voice recognition applications, which is used as aninput to natural language processing applications. As set forth indetail above, the natural language processing applications determine themeaning and context of the words contained in the vocal response that isreceived by the remote terminal 12. Referring once again to FIG. 2, oncethe meaning and context of the recognized words contained in the vocalresponse have been determined, the natural language application isprogrammed to generate a structured business request that is sent to thelocation-based application server 28. The location-based applicationserver 28 includes at least one business/services finder application 62that is operable to process the structured business request byretrieving the requested information.

[0081] As set forth in detail above, the remote terminal 12 also sends aremote terminal identifier with the vocal response that ispreferentially integrated in some manner with the structured businessrequest that is ultimately generated and sent to the location-basedapplication server 28. In addition, in this preferred embodiment of thepresent invention as well as others, a geographic indicator and a remoteterminal identifier associated with the respective remote terminal 12making the structured business request is also obtained or has alreadybeen obtained by the location-based application server 28. Asillustrated in FIG. 2, the geographic indicator and the structuredbusiness request are used by the business/services finder application 62to generate a structured business response that is responsive to thestructured business request. In our current example, the preferredbusiness/services finder application 62 uses the geographic indicator ofthe remote terminal 12 to determine which particular Burger Kinglocation is closest to remote terminal 12. A mapping routine within thebusiness/services finder application 62 compares the geographic locationof the remote terminal 12 with the respective geographic locations ofBurger King restaurants retrieved by the structured business request andmakes the determination of which location is closest to the remoteterminal 12, which can be based on the distance of the remote terminal12 from each respective location. As illustrated in FIG. 2, this isaccomplished by a data access routine 64 that accesses the appropriateinformation from the business data files 56, which preferentiallycontains a database of business listings, addresses, products and/orservices provided.

[0082] After the appropriate information is located, the location-basedapplication server 28 is programmed to generate a structured businessresponse that is sent to the voice synthesis server 33. The voicesynthesis server 33 converts the structured business response into avoice signal that is then sent to remote terminal 12. In this example,the structured business response would contain the address of the BurgerKing that is closest to remote terminal 12, which has been determined bythe location-based application server 28 based on the geographiclocation of remote terminal 12.

[0083] In yet another example of this embodiment of the presentinvention, a user of the business services might request information ona retail store that sells a specific product or provides a specificservice. For instance, a user might state: “Who sells or providesproduct/service (stating the particular product/service desired)?” Afterthe voice recognition application and the natural language processingapplication interpret and transform the request into a structuredbusiness request, the business/services finder application 62 uses thegeographic indicator of remote terminal 12 to narrow the structuredbusiness request to retrieve business information contained within apredefined geographic area in which the remote terminal 12 is located.If more than one business sells the item or provides the requestedservice, the business/services finder application 62 is programmed togenerate a structured business response that is sent to voice synthesisserver 33 containing a listing of the respective businesses meeting thedesired criteria.

[0084] In yet another preferred embodiment of the present invention, theuser is able to access the location-based services system 10 by using awireless application protocol to generate and transmit structuredrequests to the location-based application server 28. A user of remoteterminal 12 uses a keypad or some other equivalent input means to accessthe location-based services system 10 from a selection menu that isgenerated on a display of remote terminal 12. In this preferredembodiment of the present invention, once a user chooses to obtainaccess to the location-based services system 10, the remote terminal 12is preferentially programmed to display a selection menu that contains alink to the business services and residential listing services providedby the location-based services system 10. Those skilled in the art wouldrecognize that various predefined links and menu selections for varioustypes of services may also be displayed that may or may not be specifiedby the user of remote terminal 12.

[0085] If the residential listing service is selected on the remoteterminal 12, the user is prompted by remote terminal 12 to enter thefirst and last name of the person for which they desire to obtaininformation. By default, the remote terminal 12 is preferentiallyprogrammed to search for a listing that is contained in the immediategeographic location of the remote terminal 12. For example, if remoteterminal 12 is located in the Atlanta metropolitan area, the search willbe preset to be conducted using the Atlanta residential listingsdatabase. In alternative embodiments of the present invention, anadditional input area is provided on the display of the remote terminal12 whereby the user may designate the particular geographic location tosearch (i.e.—a city and state input location). As apparent, this allowsthe user to vary the location searched based on user preferences therebyproviding further benefits to the user.

[0086] An additional item the remote terminal 12 is programmed togenerate on the display is an icon or a selection area that isdesignated to cause the remote terminal 12 to transmit the searchrequest, which contain the parameters that have been input by the user,to the base station 16 of the wireless communication system 14. Aspreviously set forth, preferentially the search request is sent to thebase station 16 using a wireless application protocol, which for thepurpose of the present invention should be broadly construed to includea broad range of standards used by various wireless communicationsystems 14. The remote terminal 12 also transmits a remote terminalidentifier with the search request, which as previously set forth, isassigned to remote terminals 12 for identification purposes. Oncereceived by the base station 16, the search request is directed to theWAP gateway 34, which in turn, is preferentially programmed to transmitall search requests that are received by users accessing thelocation-based services system 10 to the WAP server 38.

[0087] The WAP server 38 is programmed to interpret the search requestand generate a structured residential request that is sent to thelocation-based application server 28. For identification purposes, theremote terminal identifier is also transmitted to the location-basedapplication server 28 with the structured residential request. As withother embodiments of the present invention, the location-basedapplication server 28 is programmed with a residential finderapplication 62 that uses one of several data access routines 64 toobtain the requested information from a respective database file 54-58.A structured response is then sent to the WAP server 38, which in turntransmits the structured response to the WAP gateway 34 and ultimatelyon to the remote terminal 12.

[0088] If the business services option is selected, the remote terminal12 prompts the user for a search request, which the user enters on theremote terminal 12. The search request is then sent to thelocation-based application server 28, in a similar fashion as describedwith the directory assistance services, where it is processed by abusiness/services finder application 62. The business/services finderapplication 62 uses data access routines 64 to retrieve the desiredinformation and generates a structured response that is based on thegeographic location of the remote terminal 12.

[0089] For example, if the remote terminal 12 is located on the uppernorth side of Atlanta, Georgia, the location-based application server 28will be informed of this fact by receiving a geographic indicator fromthe second remote terminal 12 and will be operable to generatestructured responses to structured requests that contain informationthat is targeted for that particular geographic location. For instance,if a user of the remote terminal 12 enters a search request forinformation on “Chinese restaurants running specials”, a structuredresponse is generated by the business/services finder application 62that provides information about Chinese restaurants on the upper northside of Atlanta, and not Chinese restaurants located in irrelevantgeographic locations, such as the far south side of Atlanta.

[0090] As previously set forth, in yet another preferred embodiment ofthe location-based services system 10 a user of the second remoteterminal 40 is connected to a subscriber web portal server 44. Thesecond remote terminal 40 and the subscriber web portal server 44 aredesigned to communicate with each other using standard web-basedprotocols (e.g.—HTML). The subscriber web portal server 44 is connectedto the location-based application server 28, thereby providing thesecond remote terminal 40 with access to the business services andenhanced directory assistance services that are offered in the preferredembodiments of the present invention.

[0091] The second remote terminal 40 is capable of providing voice orkeypad input data to the subscriber web portal server 44. As previouslyset forth, for voice signals the respective vocal responses are sent tothe voice recognition servers 24 for processing and, in the case ofkeypad input data, the subscriber portal web server 44 is operable togenerate structured requests in response to user requests received fromthe second remote terminal 40 in similar manners as set forth above. Thepreferred location-based services system 10 is capable of allowing itssubscribers to take advantage of the services provided by the presentinvention in a non-wireless environment as well, by supporting the useof standard computing devices that are typically used at home or work.

[0092] As such, by way of example only, lets say a user of the secondremote terminal 40 is located in Atlanta, Georgia, and wants to findlocal deals on Polo merchandise as well as stores that carry thisparticular brand that are located near their respective geographiclocation. In the case of a keypad input search, the user would beprompted for a search request from a web page generated on the secondremote terminal 40 where they would enter their desired searchparameters, which in the present example might be in the form of thewords “POLO MERCHANDISE”.

[0093] After the search request is entered and the user is ready to sendthe request, there is also preferentially an icon or some other type ofselection indicator that is generated on a web page being displayed onthe second remote terminal 40 that allows the user to submit therequest. Once this is selected, the search request, a second remoteterminal identifier and a geographic indicator are sent to thesubscriber web portal server 44. The subscriber web portal server 44then transforms the search request into a structured search request thatis sent to the location-based application server 28, which processes thestructured request similar to other embodiments of the presentinvention.

[0094] In the case of a voice signal input being used, the user would beprompted to state their respective request much like in the example setforth above with relation to wireless remote terminal 12. As such, inthe case of our present example, the user would state “POLO MERCHANDISE”after being prompted for a business services request. This vocalresponse is sent to the voice recognition server 24, which as previouslyset forth, processes the vocal response similar to other embodimentsherein described.

[0095] As such, in our present example, a user of the second remoteterminal 40 would be provided with a structured response from thelocation-based application server 28 that contained information relatingto businesses that sell Polo merchandise in a geographic location thatis relatively close to the second remote terminal 40. In fact, in everyembodiment of the present invention, the user may also be given optionof selecting a predetermined geographic radius for which they wishresponses to be generated during operation. By way of example only, arespective user may only desire to obtain information on businesseslocated within 15 miles of the remote terminals 12, 40 and as such, mayset a setting provided on the remote terminal 12, 40 that only allowsresponses to business services requests to be generated within a 15 mileradius of the remote terminal 12, 40.

[0096] Referring once again to FIG. 1, a wireless carrier 70 may also beconnected to the data files 54-60 through a wireless carrier server 72.The wireless carrier server 72 is preferentially operable to monitor thedata that is contained in the data files 54-60. As such, duringoperation of the location-based services system 10 the wireless carrierserver 72 can update a subscriber data file 74 as users of the remoteterminals 12, 40 access the location-based services system 10. Thisallows the wireless carrier 70 to keep track of the usage of thelocation-based services system 10 and may allow various charges to beapplied to the user if applicable.

[0097] Referring to FIG. 1, in yet another preferred embodiment of thepresent invention consumers are provided the ability to search via aremote terminal 12, 40 for a business that will satisfy specificpurchase or service requirements via multiple access methods, which asset forth above may include using voice commands, wireless applicationprotocols or web application protocols. The consumers are allowed tosearch for products, which as used herein shall refer collectively togoods and services. Based upon the parameters included in the searchquery or structured request that is input by the consumer, thelocation-based services system 10 will identify and respond to consumerrequests with the most appropriate matches. Likely, these matches willpreferentially include special offers or deals that are used byadvertisers to attract potential consumers to purchase their respectiveproducts, services or visit their business locations.

[0098] Referring to FIG. 3, depending on the access method used, at step100 the consumer uses his or her remote terminal 12, 40 to submit arequest or query for a deal on a particular product or service using thelocation-based services system 10. The search request is then processedby the location-based services system 10, which is represented at step102. At step 104, the location-based services system 10 determines if avalid search result is found in response to the search request. If avalid search result is generated by the location-based services system10, the search result is then sent to the consumer and displayed on theremote terminal 12, 40, which is illustrated at step 106. If no validsearch results are obtained, the consumer is prompted to either enteranother search by being allowed to refine their search or they areallowed to exit the location-based services system 10, which isrepresented at step 108.

[0099] As previously set forth, if a valid search result is obtained thesearch results are displayed on the remote terminal 12, 40. The consumeris provided with the ability to review details about each of the matchedlistings using the remote terminal 12, 40. As set forth above, thelistings preferentially include special deals or offers that areresponsive to the consumer's input. For illustrative purposes only,let's say a consumer enters a search request such as: “Who has a dinnerspecial near my present location tonight?” In response to this searchrequest, the location-based services system 10 might generate a responsesuch as “The Tavern Restaurant and Bar in downtown Atlanta is offeringyou $15 off of your total dinner purchase of $40 or more with the use ofyour American Express Card for your dinner purchase. Please mentionoffer 10789.” Of course, more than one response or offer may bepresented in a menu format on a display of the remote terminal 12, 40 orin the case of voice commands, the consumer may use keys or anotherinput device on the remote terminal as well as voice commands to selectoffers that are presented in a list or menu format by the voicesynthesis server 33.

[0100] During operation, when consumers make search requests theinformation contained in each search request is preferentially capturedand stored in the usage data files 60 within the location-based servicessystem 10. The response that is generated to each search request is alsocaptured and stored for tracking purposes. The information that iscaptured and stored in the usage data files 60 may include, but is notnecessarily limited to the following: a campaign number or identifier, amerchant name, a consumer name (or encoded id), a consumer wirelessnumber (or encoded id), a campaign code, a date, a time, a geographiclocation of the consumer when making the request, and an offer number.

[0101] After the businesses or offers are displayed to the consumer, theconsumer is provided with an option of selecting a particular businesslisting or offer at step 110. If the consumer does not select aparticular business listing or offer they are provided with the abilityto either conduct another search, which is represented at step 108, orexit the location-based services system 10. If the consumer selects abusiness listing or offer in the list that is presented to the user,then the location-based services system 10 saves the business listing oroffer to a personal list that this associated with the consumer in theusage data files 60, which is represented at step 112. Thelocation-based services system 10 also saves the information about theconsumer's selection in usage data files 60 that are associated with theselected business so that the selected business can be notified aboutthe consumer's purchase or request.

[0102] Referring to FIG. 4, in one preferred embodiment of the presentinvention the consumer would go to the place of business that made theoffering or appeared in the business listing that is presented to theconsumer, which is represented at step 120. When applicable, at step 122the consumer presents the offer number to the business that is generatedat the time of the initial interaction on the location-based servicessystem 10. At step 124, the business would then validate the offernumber if provided or necessary by looking up information associatedwith the offer number on the business remote terminal 46. In order tovalidate the offer, the business remote terminal 46 accesses the usagedata files 60 to determine the exact nature of the offer and whatservice or product should be provided to the consumer based on thatoffer.

[0103] After the offer number has been approved, the consumer thencompletes the purchase process by paying for the item with a designatedelectronic payment card, which is represented at step 126. When theconsumer completes the purchase transaction via an electronic paymentcard, the information is captured and is sent to the card issuer forpayment at step 128. At this point, the business is paid for itsrespective goods or services and the consumer is able to receive theirrespective goods or services. In alternative embodiments, the entiretransaction can be completed by remote terminals 12, 40, especially ininstances that do not require a visit to a business location by theconsumers.

[0104] As illustrated at step 130, the location-based services system 10also sends the card data within a card data file, preferentially in aperiodic batch process, to a card database 132. The card data is thendownloaded by the location-based services system 10 from the carddatabase 132 at step 134 and then uploaded into the usage data files 60at step 136. Key information found within the electronic card datainclude, but are not necessarily limited to, the following: card number,merchant code, merchant name, address of merchant, transaction type,name of consumer items or services purchased, amount of purchase, dateof purchase, and time of purchase.

[0105] Referring to FIG. 3, although not specifically illustrated, oncethe consumer selects the business listing offering at step 112, theconsumer could also arrange to have the product or service delivered orprovided at a predefined address. Some products or services that arepurchased using the location-based services system 10 may not requirethe consumer to travel to the business location in order to complete thetransaction. However, it is envisioned that most consumers will betraveling to the business location to complete the transaction, such asfinding a restaurant that is running a dinner special or a store runninga special on a particular item in the geographic location of theconsumer.

[0106] Referring to FIG. 5, the preferred steps performed by anadvertising effectiveness application 140 are illustrated in FIG. 4. Theadvertising effectiveness application 140 utilizes the business datafiles 56 and the usage data files 60 in the location-based servicessystem 10 to generate analysis surrounding the effectiveness oflocation-based advertising campaigns. The analysis is capable ofaddressing questions such as “How many people received my campaign inthe downtown area of Atlanta?” The information provided to advertisersprovides them with insight to quantify the results of advertisingcampaigns created with the location-based services system 10.

[0107] The user must first determine and enter the input variables thatwill be used for searching, which is preferentially done via a web-basedinterface using the business remote terminal 46. Once a search query isentered, it is used to retrieve and view the data stored in the businessdata files 56 and the usage data database 60. The advertisingeffectiveness application 140 retrieves data from the business datafiles 56 and the usage data database 60 to match request parameters thatare input by the user. The advertising effectiveness application 140will then forward the search results to a usage analysis user interface142, which displays the resulting search response via the web browser onthe business remote terminal 46.

[0108] Referring to FIG. 4, during operation a user of business remoteterminal 46 receives a search query entry form from the usage analysisuser interface 142. The search query entry form is preferentiallygenerated from an advertising effectiveness routine 144 that isassociated with the usage analysis user interface 142. Once a userenters search parameters into the fields on the query entry form, asearch request is sent from the business remote terminal 46 to theadvertiser portal 50. The search request is then directed to a dataaccess component 64, which searches the business data file 56 and theusage data files 60 to retrieve search results that match the criteriaset forth in the search request. The search results may then be directedtoward a data scoring application 146, which is capable of reformattingthe search results into various different types of data formats.

[0109] As illustrated in FIG. 1, in the preferred embodiment of thepresent invention the content files 52 are located on the location-basedapplication server 28. As such, although not specifically illustrated,the advertising effectiveness application 140 may have to access thelocation-based application server 28 to retrieve the desiredinformation. In addition, the data access component 64 is preferentiallylocated on the location-based application server 28. As such, theadvertising effectiveness application 140 preferentially generatessearch requests that are transmitted to the data access component 64which in turn, actually performs the searching on the location-basedapplication server 28. However, in other preferred embodiments of thepresent invention the content files 52 could be mirrored on theadvertiser portal 50 and all processes could be performed at thatlocation as well.

[0110] Once the search results are placed in the proper format, theadvertising effectiveness routine 144 uses the usage analysis userinterface 142 to generate a viewable output on the business remoteterminal 46. Preferentially, the results are provided using a webbrowser on the business remote terminal 46; however, other ways ofproviding the results may also be used. The search results may bedisplayed using numbers, graphs, charts, images or any other method forproviding analysis results.

[0111] A list of inputs (at a minimum) that may be used within theadvertising effectiveness application 140 include, but are notnecessarily limited to: a respective advertising campaign, demographicinformation, a date or time period, location information, by category,type of listing category, competitive listing categories and a key wordinputs. Examples of the type of feedback the user will receive include(but are not necessarily limited to) the following: measure of number ofcustomers reached; frequency of advertisement or listing; competitiveanalysis comparing advertising listing frequency to category; cost perimpression; number of customers reached by top three demographicsegments; and 1) demographics (gender, age, ethnicity, marital status,children, income, special interests, hobby, education, homeowner, carowner); 2) target market (city and state); and 3) location (address andlocation at time of historical interaction).

[0112] In order for the merchant/advertiser to determine the campaign ordeal offering success, the advertiser will access the advertiser portal50 within the location-services system 10. The advertiser will then usethe usage analysis user interface 142 and the advertising effectivenessroutine 144 to determine how many people responded to the deal orspecial offer.

[0113] Selecting and submitting information to a search query allowsbusinesses to explore and search the advertising campaign data stored inthe business content database 52. The location-based services system 10retrieves data from the usage data files 60 to match the requestparameters input by the user. The system will then display the resultingresponse via the web browser. Examples of the type of feedback the userwill receive include (but not limited to the following: measure ofnumber of customers reached, amount of tracked sales, number of trackedsales, competitive analysis comparing advertiser listing sales tocategory sales, cost per sale, total sales reached by top 3 demographicsegments, demographics (i.e.—gender, age, ethnicity, marital status,children, income, special interests, hobby, education, homeowner, carowner), target market, city, state, location, address, and location atpoint of interaction.

[0114] While the invention has been described in its currentlybest-known modes of operation and embodiments, other modes, embodimentsand advantages of the present invention will be apparent to thoseskilled in the art and are contemplated herein.

What is claimed is:
 1. A method for tracking purchases in alocation-based services system, comprising the steps of: receiving arequest for information on a particular product from a consumer using aremote terminal; generating a geographically tailored response to saidrequest with said location-based services system; displaying at leastone offer to said consumer based on said geographically tailoredresponse; and processing an acceptance of a respective offer made bysaid consumer.
 2. The method of claim 1, further comprising the step ofassigning a campaign offer identifier to each said geographicallytailored response.
 3. The method of claim 2, further comprising the stepof storing said campaign offer identifier and said offer in a usagedatabase.
 4. The method of claim 3, further comprising the step ofassociating said campaign offer identifier with said consumer and arespective business making said offer.
 5. The method of claim 1, furthercomprising the step of charging said consumer for said product.
 6. Themethod of claim 5, wherein an electronic payment card is charged forsaid product.
 7. The method of claim 6, further comprising the step ofstoring information about said electronic payment card, wherein saidinformation may be selected from a group of information including a cardnumber, a merchant code, a merchant name, a merchant address, atransaction type, a identifier of products purchased, an amount ofpurchase, a date of purchase and a time of purchase.
 8. The method ofclaim 1, wherein said geographically tailored response is generatedbased on a geographic setting made on said remote terminal by saidconsumer.
 9. The method of claim 1, further comprising the step ofstoring a plurality of information about said offer, wherein saidinformation is selected from a group of information including a campaignidentifier, a merchant name, a consumer identifier, a campaign code, adate, a time, a geographic location of said consumer and an offernumber.
 10. A method for tracking purchases in a location-based servicessystem, comprising the steps of: generating a tailored request forinformation on a product using a remote terminal; generating ageographic indicator associated with said remote terminal; transmittingsaid tailored request for information on said product and saidgeographic indicator to a location-based application server; generatinga structured response to said tailored request for information on saidproduct with said location-based application server, wherein saidstructured response is dependent on said geographic indicator of saidremote terminal; transmitting said structured response to said remoteterminal in the form of at least one offer; displaying said offer onsaid remote terminal; and transmitting an acceptance of said offer tosaid location-based application server.
 12. The method of claim 10,further comprising the step of assigning a campaign offer identifier toeach said offer.
 13. The method of claim 10, further comprising the stepof storing a plurality of information about said offer, wherein saidinformation is selected from a group of information including a campaignidentifier, a merchant name, a consumer identifier, a campaign code, adate, a time, a geographic location of said consumer and an offernumber.
 14. The method of claim 10, further comprising the step ofcharging an electronic payment card associated with a user of saidremote terminal.
 15. The method of claim 14, further comprising the stepof storing information about said electronic payment card, wherein saidinformation may be selected from a group of information including a cardnumber, a merchant code, a merchant name, a merchant address, atransaction type, a identifier of products purchased, an amount ofpurchase, a date of purchase and a time of purchase.
 16. The method ofclaim 10, wherein said tailored request for information on said productis a voice signal provided by a user of said remote terminal.
 17. Themethod of claim 10, wherein said tailored request for information onsaid product is transmitted using a wireless application protocol andcomprises a text-based tailored request for information.
 18. The methodof claim 10, wherein said tailored request for information on saidproduct is transmitted to said location-based application server fromsaid remote terminal using a web-based protocol.
 19. The method of claim10, wherein said tailored request for information on said product istransmitted to said location-based application server from said remoteterminal in a structured format by selections made from a menu systemgenerated on a display of said remote terminal.
 20. The method of claim10, wherein said geographic indicator is set by a user of said remoteterminal.
 21. The method of claim 10, wherein said structured responsecomprises a voice signal.
 22. A location-based services system withpurchase tracking, comprising: a remote terminal capable of generating atailored request for information on a product and a geographicindicator; a location-based application server connected to said remoteterminal operable to receive said tailored request for information andsaid geographic indicator from said remote terminal; and wherein saidlocation-based application server is operable to generate a structuredresponse to said tailored request for information on said product thatis dependent on said geographic indicator, wherein said structuredresponse is transmitted to said remote terminal and displayed on saidremote terminal in the form of at least one offer.
 23. Thelocation-based services system of claim 22, wherein a user of saidremote terminal transmits an acceptance of a respective offer to saidlocation based services system.
 24. The location-based services systemof claim 23, wherein an electronic payment card is used to pay for thepurchase of the contents in said offer.
 25. The location-based servicessystem of claim 24, wherein a plurality of information related to saidelectronic payment card is stored in a usage data file, wherein saidinformation about said electronic payment card may be selected from agroup of information including a card number, a merchant code, amerchant name, a merchant address, a transaction type, a identifier ofproducts purchased, an amount of purchase, a date of purchase and a timeof purchase.
 26. The location-based services system of claim 22, whereina campaign offer identifier is assigned to each offer.
 27. Thelocation-based services system of claim 22, wherein a plurality ofinformation related to said offer is stored in a usage data file,wherein said information is selected from a group of informationcomprising a campaign identifier, a merchant name, a consumeridentifier, a campaign code, a date, a time, a geographic location ofsaid consumer and an offer number.
 28. The location-based servicessystem of claim 22, wherein said tailored request for information onsaid product comprises a voice signal provided by a user of said remoteterminal.
 29. The location-based services system of claim 22, whereinsaid tailored request for information on said product is transmitted tosaid location-based application server using a wireless applicationprotocol and comprises a text-based tailored request for information.30. The location-based services system of claim 22, wherein saidtailored request for information on said product is transmitted to saidlocation-based application server using a web-based protocol.
 31. Thelocation-based services system of claim 22, wherein said geographicindicator is set by a user of said remote terminal.
 32. Thelocation-based services system of claim 22, wherein said structuredresponse comprises a voice signal generated by a voice synthesis server.